The Ontology of Abundance
What is abundance?
Let’s start with breath — this primordial rhythm.
No one can say they know its origin no matter how much they attempt to measure it.
All posts tagged: Reflections
What Are We Learning? A Brief Thought on Space, Time and Borders
There is so much knowledge and wisdom embedded in the unknown. Thus, when one says, “I do not know” it does not always mean one is not wise. Quite the contrary. The unknown is a headroom. The ever sprawling horizon. It is an ordered hierarchy that discreetly and patiently hold the missing pieces of our logic, waiting for us to weave our way to it.
A Year in Retrospect: Beauty Is
The year 2023 was marked by global challenges and tragedy, particularly in Israel and Gaza. The author sees hope in the ordinary citizens protesting for a more harmonious world. They inspire everyone to stand up for a better future, emphasizing the beauty at the core of humanity. The coming year is seen as an opportunity to advocate for peace and a more honorable concept of humanity.
A Double Entendre in Difference: Educating Children for a Planetary Future.
The essay discusses the importance of language and terminology used when addressing children with learning difficulties in an international bilingual school. The author argues that terms like “learning differently” can still be stigmatising and suggests using expressions like “children requiring further assistance in learning” instead. They propose a shift in focus from the child’s inadequacies to the teacher’s methodology and the need for tailored educational strategies. The author emphasises the need to embrace diversity and prioritise critical thinking, adaptability, and creativity in education. The article calls for a reevaluation of the education system to prepare children for a diverse and interconnected world.
Two Months in Barcelona: A Recap
Yesterday, it rained and somewhat doused the sunniness of the city. Yet, it rendered the coal-tarred roads, streets, and pavement glasslike and reflective — like a mirage. There is something about the earth-colour aesthetic prevalent in the city. It lends warmth and cosiness even to a gloomy atmosphere. In the sun’s absence, the sky acts like a giant softbox, the rain a diffuser. Tungsten-lit stalls and shops come alive — like a film set. A framed iconic photo of Nina Simone is placed almost centre frame. I would wonder why it had to be so evident. I didn’t go into the shop to ask. But I allowed myself the thought that the story could be more intimate than meets the eye: “I had a chance encounter with Nina Simone, which changed my life”. You see, here in Barcelona, there is a veil over blackness. That much I have noticed since my arrival. Such a veil makes invisibility and hyper-visibility feel like two sides of the same coin. I still do not have enough appraisal of …
Is Amoeba Shapeless, or is Shapelessness a Shape?
I want to begin this reflection by taking some memory-steps back to my high school days when I was a science student. In our biology class, we were introduced to Amoeba, the shapeless, single-cell organism. As with most students of my age, the only character of this organism I really retained was its shapelessness. How can something be shapeless? I often wondered. The whole premise of materiality, or physicality is form. If something can be seen as much as touched, then it is bound to have a shape. Even as I write, I recall how “shapeless amoeba” became a derogatory expression often employed, as a joke or mean insult, to describe someone’s head whose contours are abnormally disproportionate. But I never got over this contradiction of something being shapeless. Many years after, and with the benefit of hindsight, I would come to understand that my life, almost in its entirety, plays out within the perimeters of this paradox. I will explain. Not too long ago, I was asked to give an artist talk on the …
Africa: A new game of “Scrabble”
We are in Amsterdam. We have been invited in the context of the 5th edition of the Unseen Photo Fair/Festival which takes places every year. We are African artists, curators and cultural operators. I have been scheduled alongside these proactive African cultural CEOs and Artistic Directors to speak in a panel. The panel in question is called ‘Platforms in Africa’. A couple of days ago, I was interviewed by a writer from Volkskrant, a very popular newspaper in The Netherlands with a readership of about 270,000. The content of this interview revolved around the most sensational perception: the sudden attention and renewed fixation on ‘Africa’ So here we are to discuss our various initiatives. We are set to go. After rounds of gruellingly long introductions by the moderator which made the whole affair seem like a live performative reading of the “About” page of websites and artists bios, we run out of time. I was disappointed to say the least. I have been invited one time too many to this kind of panel discussions, that …
A Photographer’s Note (I)
These notes are jottings inspired by the reading (and being in the sense) of John Berger’s Understanding a Photograph. Sometimes I paraphrase or quote the said author, and other times I form thoughts of my own that elaborate as much as extend certain remarkable impulses: 1. Something propels me to photograph. It is there or it isn’t. What is this? That’s the big question. I do not know. Some say it is intuition. But has intuition not been exhausted in definition? So much that by now I should know for certain? Perhaps it’s a thing. The only thing that I am. 2. Oftentimes I ask myself why I photograph. Times like this I resort to looking at images in general – mostly of others, but also of mine. I look through images shared on social media (since the aim of sharing here is to engage socially) by many professional/amateur photographers. I realise that there is a tendency to beautify. To take what we already know and present them in the form of consumerist beauty. One that …
What to Make of Differences in the African Experience (1)
In Berlin, I had the pleasure of catching up with some longtime friends and colleagues. Luckily it was in a low key Nigerian restaurant that allowed for conversations in off-pitch tones and wild laughter. On the table was a Nigerian and a Cameroonian who had been living and working in Berlin for 20 years or thereabout; two Ghanaians who just flew in for a performance—one of them of Romanian origin; a Nigerian who arrived Berlin from Libreville; and myself, a Nigerian who just got in from Amsterdam. There you have it: a heterogeneous mix of Africans that immediately trumps a simplistic notion of Pan-Africanism. It was the perfect setting for an impromptu debate about what Africa, or blackness should and should not be. It was a rich conversation, cutting across many historical pointers but geared towards one question: How do we change the status quo and inspire progress that breaks away from the pitfalls of neocolonialism? A departure point for me was to scale back to the time of Kwame Nkrumah, the symbolical figure of Ghana’s independence and a key pioneer of the concept …
Exploring a Void – “The Middle Ground”
In my previous writing, A Border Philosophy, I discussed the nature of a border, as something porous but concurrently has the tendency to be a vacuum as a result of the various positionings of what it tends to separate. In taking that argument further, I propose to discuss this vacuum as a space that is no longer a space of nothingness but an In-between or an “Interstitial” space (Bhabha, 1994) – within which the negotiations of many intersecting factors give form to the nature and potency of a given border condition. Often times when we make references to a border, it is in relation to an outward physical quality that imposes one form of limitation or the other – be it in our everyday lives or in the more institutionalized context of borders between nations. A visual rendition of a border might lead us to conjure a thick mass of matter the size of one’s imagination obscuring further vision or the possibility of a more distant horizon. It could also come to us in form …
DIARY OF A BORDER-BEING 